After the interim government led by Dr Muhammad Yunus was installed on 8 August, educational institutions reopened along with everything else on Sunday. Then following a few days of unrest and uncertainty, normalcy has been restored in public life. And there is the pressure of vehicles on the roads again.
In the meantime, various professional bodies and groups took to the streets on Sunday with their various demands, creating horrendous traffic congestion. Even on Monday, the scenario in Dhaka was the same. There was even talk of blockades on the outskirts of Dhaka, in demand of due wages. So the residents of Dhaka suffered two days because of traffic jams.
How can this suffering be assuaged? People can't be held hostage at home because of the traffic jams. People need to go out for their livelihood and they must be able to go out unhindered and with ease.
Prothom Alo reported that various groups had taken to the streets with various demands including that their jobs be made permanent, that the HSC exams be cancelled and so on. Roads were blocked at eight different important points of the city to stage demonstrations, human chains and gatherings. The resulting traffic jams brought public life to a standstill. Before, political parties would block the roads to bring home their demands. Now professionals are doing it too. Roads must not be blocked for any reason whatsoever.
Other than the various programmes, there are two more reasons for the traffic congestion. After the Awami League government exited from the scene, the police were not joining their work places saying they felt insecure. They returned to work after quite a long spell upon orders from the government, but were not carrying out their duties in full. They were often seen to be inactive. The students had been extremely active in controlling the traffic initially, but now they are back to their studies. The police must now perform their duties. There can be no scope to shirk their responsibilities.
We hope the authorities shortly resolve the problems and start metro rail up again. If not, the people will start thinking that even after governments are changed, suffering lingers on
Secondly, the former government had introduced the metro rail to address the traffic jams. While it may not have served to reduce the traffic jams all over Dhaka, it did provide a relief to a significant amount of people, officer-goers and students in particular. But after two stations were attacked during the July student-people's uprising, the metro rail service shut down.
The interim government hasn't even been two weeks at the helm. The question is, how justified is it to take to the streets with all sorts of demands right now? Even if the demands are reasonable, they must carry out their programmes without disrupting public life. They can hold seminars and press conferences to get their demands.
The traffic police are mainly responsible for controlling the traffic jams. We hope they do their duty duly. When the metro rail was attacked, at the time it was said that it will take extremely long to repair it. Later after technical examination, the authorities decided to resume the service last Saturday. But they couldn't do so because of a worker strike. The lower level workers were striking for an increase in wages. We hope the authorities shortly resolve the problems and start metro rail up again. If not, the people will start thinking that even after governments are changed, suffering lingers on.